Succinctly put by Steven Greenberg of the Ventura County Star.
I would have to say it’s an open question as to whether or not these Republicans are adherents to the “Starve the Beast” strategy or are just pure hypocrites on the matter of fiscal responsibility.
The McCain campaign is now clumsily attempting to jumpstart/simulate a grassroots web presence according to the Washington Post:
On McCain’s Web site, visitors are invited to “Spread the Word” about the presumptive Republican nominee by sending campaign-supplied comments to blogs and Web sites under the visitor’s screen name. The site offers sample comments (“John McCain has a comprehensive economic plan . . .”) and a list of dozens of suggested destinations, conveniently broken down into “conservative,” “liberal,” “moderate” and “other” categories. Just cut and paste.
Activists and political operatives have used volunteers or paid staff to seed radio call-in shows or letters-to-the-editor pages for years, typically without disclosing the caller or letter writer’s connection to a candidate or cause. Like the fake grass for which the practice is named, such AstroTurf messages look as though they come from the grass roots but are ersatz.
McCain’s campaign has taken the same idea and given it an Internet-era twist. It also has taken the concept one step further.
People who sign up for McCain’s program receive reward points each time they place a favorable comment on one of the listed Web sites (subject to verification by McCain’s webmasters). The points can be traded for prizes, such as books autographed by McCain, preferred seating at campaign events, even a ride with the candidate on his bus, known as the Straight Talk Express, according to campaign spokesman Brian Rogers.
This could just be me – but I cannot recall if I have ever seen, posted in the comments here or on other websites, canned or barely rehashed Obama talking points. I’ve had Hillary talking points posted – and Ron Paul talking points – and I’ve seen anti-Obama talking points. And I’ve seen all of these in many other places as well.
It always seems to me to be a sign of a candidate’s weakness when irrelevant talking points start appearing. If a campaign has a true grass-roots presence, their message will be amplified and – more important – owned by many people. These people will respond authentically and incorporate the talking points without repeating them verbatim.
[digg-reddit-me]A friend of mine wrote to me yesterday regarding his concern about the windfall profits tax that Obama is current proposing for oil companies. He explained that that the very idea of this tax attacks the very essence of capitalism.
And while I see his point, and am wary of political actions that involves scapegoating any isolated source, I don’t share his feelings on the subject. The reason is simply this: the oil companies have been bad actors for some time – as he acknowledges; they have taken steps to ensure that Americans never developed alternative fuels, and have decided more recently to pocket much of the profit instead of investing it in developing alternate fuels. Rather than leading the way in helping to free America from it’s reliance on oil – which not only is driving global climate change, causing pollution, propping up anti-American and tyrannical forces around the world from Russia to the Arab world, and creating the most massive transfer of wealth in the history of humankind – Big Oil has worked to ensure the system stays as it is.
Throughout American history, presidents have attacked and modified the basic foundations of capitalism when they felt it was necessary to protect essential American institutions and values. Abraham Lincoln liberated the property of millions of Southern plantation owners; Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and Harry Truman created systems of wage and price controls; private property was regularly and promiscuously confiscated by the government to make way for railroads and highways and now anything that will generate higher tax revenues; tariffs and subsidies have always distorted capitalism – as did regulation, once it became commonplace.
What we see in the history of America and capitalism is a constant balancing act – between free market forces and the forces that wish to preserve an ordered society. Capitalism – by it’s nature – is exploitative. Unregulated capitalism is what drove America’s growth through the 1870s, 1880s, and 1890s – as workers were abused, killed, and entirely exploited – living in shanty-towns like slaves – as big corporations bought Congressmen by the dozen and forced through laws benefiting them – all of this for the benefit of a wealthy few. This was capitalism. And then in the 1950s, with the top marginal tax rate set over 90% and the gap between the rich and the poor narrower than ever, with unions representing 36% of workers, that too was capitalism. Both the bustling city of Alexander Hamilton and the idyllic country farm of Thomas Jefferson were capitalistic. For all the talk of “creeping socialism” over the past half-century, the only time America came close was the direct result of the inaction of Herbert Hoover and the overcompensation by Franklin Delano Roosevelt. And at no point was America ever purely capitalistic.
Civil liberties, once given away, are extremely difficult to get back; executive power, once taken, is rarely relinquished; but American-style capitalism has proved to be a canny system, surviving under even the most stringent regulations and fighting it’s way back until, as before, it’s excesses trigger a response.
Under this understanding, I can accept the idea of a windfall profits tax.
The government has always been intruded in the economy. During the late 1800s, the government fought for and protected the interests of the rich against the poor and anyone else (although this period comes closest to demonstrating what a laissez-faire system would produce); during the 1950s and 1960s, the government protected the middle class; by the late 1960s and 1970s, the government had shifted it’s focus to the poor. Today, the government has once again shifted to the protection of the rich – while maintaining some of the programs that protected the middle class and the poor. The Financial Times of London observed just a few weeks ago that while the government let homeowners in default fail by the thousands, they could not let any big corporations fail and that by privatizing profits and socializing losses, the American government is practicing socialism for the rich. Is a windfall profits tax any greater of an intrusion into the market, an undermining of capitalism, than the attitude that if you become big enough, the government will not let you fail – and while you can keep your profits, your losses will be socialized?
What Obama is specifically proposing is to give a $1,000 emergency energy rebate to consumers – a tax cut for individuals – paid for by this windfall profits tax. With many of our national economic woes directly tied to the oil industry which is making more profit than at any time in history – this seems just in this instance, even if it is flawed in theory.
I’m not crazy about the idea – but I do see it as an appropriate punishment for big oil – who, though their poor stewardship of a national security asset, have endangered our way of life. Thus far, for their bad behavior, they have been rewarded with the greatest profits of any corporation in history.
While I see that this windfall profits tax could set a bad precedent – I do think it can be justified in this instance.
The real conversation here – and the real reason for this proposal by Obama – is not about economic policy, but about politics. John McCain recently reversed his position on offshore drilling to take the popular position that we should open up those few areas designated to be preserved for drilling. This will not affect oil prices for at least seven years – and distracts us from the real problem at hand – a disastrous national addiction to oil. But the politics was too good for McCain to pass it up – and now he is using this cudgel of offshore drilling to club Obama.
Obama’s response to this is his proposal for a windfall profits tax.
As Kevin Drum sees the politics of this:
As a one-off, this probably doesn’t have much impact, but if it’s a harbinger of things to come — and I assume it is — it holds huge promise. It’s just like McCain’s legendary series of flip-flops: on an individual basis they don’t matter too much, but when you put them together into a coherent narrative they make a powerful story. After all, pretty much every McCain flip flop has a single source — changing his position to be more acceptable to the anti-tax, big business, Christian conservative base of the Republican Party
I don’t know if any of this will make my friend feel any better. But it is a position I can accept. As a policy, I don’t think it’s the best idea – and I don’t think it helps solve any problems. But as politics – which is the only way to understand it – it is pitch-perfect for the times.
It is a complete waste of the money John McCain’s contributors have donated to his campaign. It is a complete waste of the country’s time and attention at the very moment when millions of people are losing their homes and their jobs. And it is a completely frivolous way to choose the next President of the United States
Kathy Hilton, Paris’s mother and prominent McCain contributor, on McCain’s new ad using her daughter as an example of negative celebrity.
I received an email from my friend this morning – an aspiring entrepreneur – regarding his concerns about Barack Obama’s economic policy – which I’ve been finding are rather widespread:
So I want to start by saying I am an Obama supporter because I really feel where he might not be the most experienced in a lot of areas he will provide a much needed catalyst to change the way America thinks and behaves with respect to a lot of important issues effecting humanity on a whole. Where his economics scare me to death, and I do hope he gets better advisers than his current ones on the economy, I still feel he is the right choice for America at this point in time.
That said, I read this article today after seeing a brief snippet on CNBC this morning regarding the same issue.I simply do not know what to say. Yes oil companies are evil. There is no question there. But just as the Patriot Act symbolized the opening of a door into the trampling of basic freedoms that make America what it is, I can not see this proposal as anything but the same. You simply can not limit the amount of profit a company can make and still call this America. Tax the profits to hell. Let the government take it’s cut, but you simply can’t open the door for government to say how much a company can or can not make. If we limit what oil companies make what is next? Pharma? Factories?
I like Barack but this is uncalled for and simply unacceptable. I will refrain from questioning if he is, in fact, an American idealist and just assume this is the result of a temporary lapse in judgment.
Now mind you this is a separate issue than personal taxes which needs its own discussion. This is about business, this is about capitalism, and this is about what makes America great.
Just my two cents (which today are worth even less Euros than yesterday)
I recently came to a new understanding about blogging.
About a week ago, I spoke with a friend of mine – who I consider to a somewhat successful businesswoman – ((I only include the qualifier ‘somewhat’ because it is obvious that she has greater ambitions.)) who explained to me that she was not sure who she was going to vote for because her top concern was the economy and she was not convinced about either candidate’s competence on this matter.
This came up as, walking by her office, she told me, motioning to the newspaper in front of her, “Obama’s economic ideas are getting torn apart here.” She was reading the editorial page of the Wall Street Journal – so, of course, they were beginning to warm to the man they had despised for these many years, as he sought to “coddle terrorists” because he was now the lapdog of the economic far right and the imperialist far right.
Of course, I mean John McCain, who tragically has sought to dispel his identity as a maverick who would stand up to the far right by groveling to the twin pillars of the elite wing of the Republican party. (McCain has been unable, or unwilling, to effectively seek the backing of the less elite, social right wing of the Republican party.) McCain, unable to give a position governing vision of his own – aside from a League of Democracies which would allow the United States to begin a new cold war with the tyrannies of the world including the two most powerful upcoming great powers, Russia and China – has sought to win the support of the three pillars of the Reagan-Bush coalition by selling visions of the social, economic, and foreign policy apocalypse that would occur should Barack Obama win the presidency.
That’s what McCain is now about – what his career has come to – demonizing Barack Obama. And I don’t think this is just some unfortunate political step McCain feels he needs to take – like endorsing the Confederate flag while campaigning in South Carolina. After he did that, McCain apologized afterwards and said he was wrong and pandering. While McCain knows many of the shots he is taking now are cheap – his early and strident attacks on Obama demonstrate a kind of urgency. McCain truly seems to have convinced himself that he deserves to be president, and Barack Obama is arrogant for challenging him.
My friend could see this – and probably agreed with most of this. But what she cared about was economics.
I discussed some issues with her, acknowledging that economics was not my strong point. But what I encountered while speaking with her was an agreement about the type of problem that we faced – a genuine structural problem within our capitalist system that had been worsening for some time – but a lack of understanding about the next steps. I believed – and tried to portray – that McCain, as a doctrinairre Republican on economics since 2006, would attempt to benefit the richest, fewest individuals while enabling the worst excesses while Barack Obama would take moderate, pragmatic steps to correct some of the underlying issues.
After speaking with her, I wanted to write one complete piece that would effectively make this case.
And for days, I wrote little else as I struggled to put together these pieces.
And that is when I realized something about blogging. The strength of a blog is not in any individual piece, but in working through the ideas in real time, responding to each day’s news events in some small way, putting a spin, adding a bit of understanding. Even as I would do that, I would still attempt to write “the piece” that would make a difference, that would change minds.
Blogging is about writing dozens of pieces – which together form a kind of journal, allowing insights into thought processes that are not available in single articles which should be consistent and coherent. Instead, blogs at their best provide a messy view of the thought process that would go behind an article, behind an idea. As people respond and attack and support a blogger’s arguments, they evolve. And that it what makes blogs a strong medium – even if it also demonstrates why they can never replace more definitive works.
Which is why I’ll now be adding another area to ruminate on – the economy.
Even Obama’s supposed private moments on his world tour ended up generating positive headlines.
There was this supposedly private exchange between Obama and Conservative party leader, David Cameron, in London caught by ABC News:
“These guys just chalk your diary up,” said Cameron, referring to a packed schedule.
“Right,” Obama said. “In 15 minute increments …”
“We call it the dentist’s waiting room,” Cameron said. “You have to scrap that because you’ve got to have time.”
“And, well, and you start making mistakes,” Obama said, “or you lose the big picture. Or you lose a sense of, I think you lose a feel- ”
“Your feeling,” interrupted Cameron. “And that is exactly what politics is all about. The judgment you bring to make decisions.”
And then there was the prayer note Obama placed in the Western Wall in Jerusalem which was taken out by a student and published on the front page of the Israeli paper Maariv:
Lord,
Protect my family and me. Forgive me my sins and help me guard against pride and despair.
Give me the wisdom to do what is right and just.
And make me an instrument of your will.
The student later apologized and replaced the note in the wall.
Meanwhile, after McCain make Obama’s trip more and more newsworthy by challenging him to go to Iraq and around the world, he was left in America whining about the media’s “love affair” with Obama – even as a new survey came out showing that though Obama received more coverage than McCain, a larger percentage of the stories were critical of Obama.
Despite this overwhelming media bias in favor of McCain, Obama is leading in virtually every poll. And if – as has traditionally happened – the media closes ranks with the Democrats come late October, this bodes well for Obama.
Fred Kaplan asks a serious question that comes up again and again among those who pay attention to foreign policy: How Much Does John McCain Really Know About Foreign Policy?
He frames the issues by asking the question that was echoed by pundits all over America in the days before Barack Obama’s foreign trip:
Would Obama, the first-term senator and foreign-policy newbie, utter an irrevocably damaging gaffe?
Kaplan then gives examples of gaffes that might hurt Obama’s foreign policy credibility seriously:
The nightmare scenarios were endless. Maybe he would refer to “the Iraq-Pakistan border,” or call the Czech Republic “Czechoslovakia” (three times), or confuse Sunni with Shiite, or say that the U.S. troop surge preceded (and therefore caused) the Sunni Awakening in Anbar province.
The kicker, of course, is that it was John McCain who made all of these gaffes, errors, other non-truths:
But, of course, it was Obama’s opponent, John McCain—the war hero and ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee—who uttered these eyebrow-raisers. “Czechoslovakia” was clearly a gaffe, and understandable for anyone who was sentient during the Cold War years. What about the others, though? Were they gaffes—slips of the tongue, blips of momentary fatigue? Or did they reflect lazy thinking, conceptual confusion, a mind frame clouded by clichéd abstractions?
And therein lies the question that anyone supporting McCain must ask – why is this “expert” on foreign policy making so many mistakes in discussing it?
So far this meme hasn’t gotten much traction – because it doesn’t fit into the established media caricature of this race – between the new and inexperienced Obama and the old and knowledgeable McCain. But at some point, you have to figure the sheer amount of these gaffes will have a public impact.
[digg-reddit-me]Putting aside the controversy over whether the New York Times should have published John McCain’s op-ed piece – his piece itself illustrates the lose-lose strategy McCain is putting forward.
This line in particular from his unpublished op-ed struck me:
…if we don’t win the war, our enemies will.
What interests me about both McCain’s and Obama’s positions is that both have stuck to their general idea about what the next step would be despite the changing situation on the ground.
McCain was in favor of troops staying longer in Iraq when things were bad and getting worse; now that things are improving, he is still in favor of keeping our forces there. Obama was in favor of pulling out of Iraq while the situation was deteriorating; and now that the situation is improving, he still is in favor of ending the occupation. McCain’s editorial tries to hit Obama on this point, unconvincingly in light of McCain’s own seeming intransigence.
But it isn’t entirely accurate to call Obama’s and McCain’s fixed goals in spite of the changing circumstances “intransigence”. The crux of the disagreement between the candidates is not the contrast that McCain sets up in his op-ed:
I have also said that any draw-downs must be based on a realistic assessment of conditions on the ground, not on an artificial timetable crafted for domestic political reasons.
Rather, the crux of their disagreement is about the wisdom of the Iraq adventure and the overall strategy of establishing some kind of neo-empire in the Middle East. McCain believes that the Iraq War was necessary and strategically sound – and that although he may not call it an empire or neo-empire – he believes America must have an established military presence in the Middle East as a matter of policy. Obama is suspicious of this view – believing that any form of imperial influence exerted over the Middle East will cause a backlash greater than the benefits – and he specifically pointed out before the war, and has kept pointing out, that the Iraq adventure was strategically “dumb” and that it was benefited our enemies in the Middle East even as it has undermined our friends. By taking out Iraq, we removed Iran’s regional foil – and we set up an Iraqi regime that has become a regional ally of Iran.
There are two competing sets of suppositions here:
First:
Second:
On the first question, the country and the world have overwhelmingly come to believe the first option.
On the second, the answer is less clear. What is clear is that:
These commonly accepted facts demonstrate our short-term tactical limits and our tactical utility – but most of all, they demonstrate that our long-term strategy is underming our position. From the Iraqi perspective, Maliki clearly thinks that it is best for Iraq if America leaves as soon as possible. Analyzing what we know about Iraq leads to the same conclusion.
The only possible long-term salvation that could come from this debacle is if Iraq becomes an American-friendly, stable democracy. Which is possible, but not the most likely conclusion based on the facts as they are now. It is a possiblity based on a desperate hope. But even this long-term possibility would necessitate that we demonstrate that we are intent to leave Iraq as soon as possible – and certainly as soon as we are asked.
McCain – by focusing on our short-term tactical successes (and ignoring our tactical limits and our strategic errors) – is bringing America down the wrong path – and setting us up to fail. By saying, “if we don’t win the war, our enemies will,” McCain is attempting to impose a framework on Iraq that does not apply. The Iraqis themselves defeated Al Qaeda and the extremists after they became tired of their extremism – with our troops playing a supporting role. One of our primary functions in Iraq is preventing a civil war between the Iraqi ethnic groups.
The question is: Is McCain himself so deluded as to see Iraq as simply a battle between us and our enemies – like World War II – or is he merely using this framework to allow him to use Iraq as a political weapon and to paint his opponent as a “weak-kneed liberal”?
So, John McCain was almost a polygamist:
Although McCain suggested in his autobiography that months passed between his divorce and remarriage, the divorce was granted April 2, 1980, and he wed Hensley in a private ceremony five weeks later. McCain obtained an Arizona marriage license on March 6, 1980, while still legally married to his first wife.
There’s no larger point I’m trying to make about this. You can be a scumbag and still be a good president. (See Clinton, Bill). But as John McCain wants to make this election about character instead of issues (probably because most of his stands on issues are unpopular – and on virtually no issues can he appease both the Republican base and the general electorate) tawdry details like this becomes more relevant.